Walker enters GOP lieutenant governor primary race

Republican lieutenant governor candidate Dave Walker announced Friday that he has filed papers to enter a three-way primary for the second highest office in Connecticut.

Walker, who has tied his campaign to gubernatorial hopeful state Sen. John McKinney, received the third-highest number of votes for lieutenant governor at last weekend’s GOP convention at Mohegan Sun. A former comptroller general of the United States, he expects to be on the Aug. 12 primary ballot.

“John and I represent a turnaround team that will focus on how to grow the economy, create jobs and put our state’s finances in order,” Walker said in a statement.

State Rep. Penny Bacchiocchi, the only lieutenant governor candidate who was not tied to a gubernatorial hopeful, won the Republican nomination with nearly 50 percent of the convention votes. Former Groton Town Mayor Heather Bond Somers, who received nearly a third of the votes, announced Thursday that she was severing ties with former running mate Mark Boughton to pursue the lieutenant governor’s post on her own.

Boughton has since said he would be running for governor in the primary with Shelton Mayor Mark Lauretti, who ran for governor but did not receive enough votes to primary. In order to get Lauretti on the ballot, according to an email from Boughton’s campaign, he will have to collect more than 8,000 valid signatures by June 10.

Tom Foley won the party endorsement for governor and said he would be happy with any running mate the voters choose. Foley faces a primary against Boughton, the mayor of Danbury, and McKinney, the Senate minority leader, who each filed papers to primary on Thursday.